FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of a conventional thermal head.
As shown in this figure, a conventional thermal head 10′ is typically provided with: a heat generating resistor element array 11 in which a plurality of heat generating resistor elements corresponding to print dots are arranged in a line; and a driver circuit (driver IC) 12 that controls driving (energization) of the heat generating resistor element array 11 according to, for example, a print data signal DI that is directly fed from a set-side interface circuit 20′ (hereinafter, set-side I/F 20′).
Examples of conventional arts related to the above description are disclosed in Patent Documents 1 to 4 listed below filed by the applicant of the present application.
Examples of conventional arts related to prevention of electromagnetic interference (EMI) occurring in data transmission from a set-side interface section to a thermal head, speeding-up of data transfer, and reduction of the number of signal lines are disclosed in, for example, Patent Documents 5 and 6 listed below.                Patent Document 1 JP-A-H04-16364        Patent Document 2 JP-A-H04-16365        Patent Document 3 JP-A-H04-305471        Patent Document 4 JP-A-H04-323048        Patent Document 5 JP-A-2002-326348        Patent Document 6 JP-A-2006-198910        